#phan fic

I stared deeper into the mirror, my fists tightening until my nails bit into my palms through my white gloves. I thought about my family, my friends—the people who had always been there. I’d already pushed them away, hadn’t I?

Maybe they aren’t even my friends anymore. Maybe I don’t deserve them.

Sam and Tucker had gone to college, following their dreams like normal people. Jazz was too busy carving her own path to stay. And me? I had stayed behind in the crumbling town I couldn’t abandon, giving up my dream of going to space. Protecting people was my purpose now. At least, that’s what I told myself. But deep down, I wasn’t so sure anymore.

Was it a noble choice—or a coward’s excuse?

You could still go. You could leave. You could be an astronaut. Fly into space. Fulfill the dream. Your dream.

But it wouldn’t be the same. Nothing ever would.

I gritted my teeth, my reflection rippling in the glass like a warped painting.

Happy thoughts, I told myself. But they didn’t come. They never did anymore. It was always easier to sink into the darker ones, to let them drag myself down into the undertow.

The mocking voices of ghosts, the weight of battles fought and won—none of it mattered in the face of the gnawing feeling in my chest.

My core.

It purred softly, a dissonant hum, both comforting and sinister.

It felt… so freaking wrong.

As if it didn’t belong to me anymore. As if Phantom—him was bleeding into me, hollowing me out from the inside.

My breath hitched. My fingers trembled as I gripped the edges of the sink. My eyes clenched shut, but it didn’t block out the image of myself—the warped, flickering, monstrous reflection staring back. I felt like a glass that was about to shatter, cracks spidering across my soul.

Stop it. Stop it. Stop it.

I punched my palms tighter until the pain jolted me back. But the ache in my chest was worse. Phantom wasn’t just part of me. Phantom was me.

My breath staggered in my throat—a sob trembling on the edge of release. My knuckles ached, my chest burned, and that pressure—that suffocating pressure—kept building on.

“Get out of my head!” I screamed, my voice raw, ripping through the suffocating silence.

The sound reverberated in the tiny room, crashing into the walls and returning to me like a ghostly echo. My reflection flickered again—glowing red of Phantom’s eyes overtaking my own for the briefest moment before fading back into green.

But it wasn’t enough.

“Leave me alone!” I shouted again, this time so forcefully that my throat hurt, as though I was tearing myself apart. The sound cracked into a wail—an uncontrollable, heart-shattering release.

Green tears left cold trails down my cheeks as I screamed again, and again, and again… until the room seemed to quake.

The mirror shattered.

Shards exploded outward, raining onto the counter, the floor, my arms. A jagged piece nicked my cheek, drawing a thin line of green that dripped down onto my trembling hand.

I didn’t care.

My reflection was gone—splintered into a thousand fractured pieces scattered at my feet.

My knees buckled, and I barely caught myself against the sink. My hands shivered, slipping on the porcelain.

I sank to the floor, my back pressed against the cold tile, knees pulled to my chest. My hands tangled in my snow-white hair as sobs wracked my body. Every shuddering breath felt like it might break me further.

The shards of glass caught the dim light, a kaleidoscope of chaos surrounding me, reflecting parts of me I couldn’t escape from.

I clutched my chest, my core still purring that discordant frequency—like a faint, mocking laugh echoing from deep within.

“I’m scared,” I whispered to—no one. My voice cracked. “I don’t want to become… him.”

My words dissolved into another sob as I curled tighter, the shattered mirror fragments glinting like stars against the dark void I felt, pulling me under.

“I will never turn into you.”

———————

Okay. First time I drew Dan. I was scared. Scared of those eyes. Those eyes that pierced the whole time into mine—no, through mine. I should’ve waited with his eyes until the end, but of course, I didn’t.

———————

The Fentons loved their children. There was no doubt about that.

They did however, get a bit caught up in their work sometimes.

Luckily their children were pretty self-sufficient teens, so the parents hardly worried much if their attention went elsewhere.

They did notice recently that maybe they need to refocus on their kids. Or more specifically, their son.

He was having a bit of a rough patch starting high school which they had been hoping would work itself out but perhaps more direct action was needed.

Once they shifted tactics they couldn’t help but notice how ecto-contaminated he was.

No wonder he was having such a hard time. His health was not at it’s best.

Luckily they had just the thing to fix it.

Or at least they had an idea to anyway.

=============================================

After a few weeks of work, which was much longer than most of their projects these days, they had a viable product.

They each took turns testing it and found it worked wonders for them.

Now they just had to get some for him.

=============================================

“Hey Danno!” Jack called cheerily from the kitchen table.

“Hey Dad,” Danny said as he rubbed the sleep out of his eyes.

“Here sweetie,” Maddie said as she set a plate with a freshly made omelet and a single dose of their latest invention at Danny’s normal seat.

He took his seat and merely raised an eyebrow at the small capsule next to his breakfast.

“It’s just a vitamin dear,” Maddie explained as she started fixing up her own omelet.

Danny shrugged and took the vitamin in one quick go, washing it down with the glass of water that was waiting for him.

“So how’d it taste?” Jack asked before Danny could get the first bite into his eggs.

“Uh? Fine? I guess. I didn’t really taste it.”

“Ah okay. Well just keep tabs on how your feeling today and let us know if anything comes up.”

Danny slowly removed the fork from his mouth and stared as he chewed.

“You know, since it’s new. We want to make sure it’s doing what it’s supposed to.”

He swallowed his food and asked, “should I be worried about what I just took?”

“Of course not,” Maddie reassured, “you know we just like to have all the data we can on our inventions.”

“You made that vitamin?" he asked, sounding oddly frighten.

“Yeah! We just want you to be the healthiest best you, you can be. And that starts with working on those incredibly high ecto-contamination levels you got there sport.”

Danny stared at his breakfast for a beat or two before he spoke again. “Are there any things I should be looking out for? Like an upset stomach or bleeding out of my ears?”

“Well hopefully none of that. Although if you were to notice that please let us know asap, okay?”

“Yeah of course.”

“You might be a little extra thirsty once it kicks in. I know I was.” Jack said with a laugh.

“How long til it kicks in?”

“Oh about an hour or two.”

“So did you guys just finish making it recently?”

“Yeah! Your Mother and I just finished our trial run the other day.”

“But you waited until today to give it to me?” he took another bite of his food as he thought and came to a realization before he finished.

“It’s because I have a 3-day weekend isn’t it?”

“You betcha!” Jack said enthusiastically.

Danny merely nodded in acknowledgement before returning to his breakfast.

=============================================

To better keep an eye on how Danny’s reaction to the vitamin was going they asked him to stay nearby. 

He sighed, but did as he was told.

“Would it be okay if I went upstairs to get something to do.”

“Of course, bud.”

“If you've got any assignments to do I'm sure your father and I could help.”

Danny nodded and got his things. 

=============================================

It was Maddie that noticed something first.

“Sweetie?”

“Yeah mom?”

“That's the third glass of water.”

He looked at the empty glass in his hand, “is that bad?”

“Well no. But it's only been an hour.”

“Oh.” He slowly set the glass down, “That’s the side effect Dad was talking about then?”

“Yeah.”

Several hours later Danny was nearly caught up on all of his homework. 

“Hey, can we have pizza tonight?”

“Oh pizza sounds good!” Jack agreed.

“I suppose,” Maddie started, “but I'm going to wait until you finish that worksheet before ordering.”

Danny groaned dramatically but then doubled his efforts to finish.

Jack chuckled as he went to fetch the local pizza place's menu. Nothing like being food motivated. 

=============================================

Jack and Maddie watched as their son devoured an entire extra large pizza in an astonishingly short period of time.

"Looks like someone was hungry,” Jack said.

Danny looked down at his plate, the now empty pizza box, then his parents.

His cheeks flushed once he realized what he had done.

“I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to eat the whole thing.”

“It’s okay sweetheart,” Maddie said, “why don’t you wash up and get ready for bed.”

Once he was out of the room Maddie pulled out her note pad and jotted down the latest symptom.

“Increased appetite," she said as she wrote.

“Gotta say I’m kind of impressed with how quick he was about it.”

“It certainly was something.” Maddie agreed, “Sure hope that one goes away soon.”

“I’m sure he’ll be fine, Mads. Besides Fenton men tend to have bigger appetites anyway. Maybe this means he’ll finally hit that growth spurt.”

=============================================

Later, after everyone had said their good-nights and fallen asleep, they were all awake again.

Danny said his mouth was hurting.

Which was an odd thing for a teenager to complain about.

Maddie went with him into the bathroom while Jack was still working on waking up all the way.

“Oh my gosh!”

Jack immediately woke up and dashed into the bathroom.

What he found was not something he ever expected.

His son had grown fangs.

“Well that explains the pain.”

“Are fangs a normal side effect?” Danny asked as he shyly covered his mouth.

“It’s not a typical one.” Maddie said diplomatically.

Which was much better than Jack’s answer.

Unfortunately he still said it.

“Not at all!”

“Jack!”

“Sorry.”

“Can you make them go away?”

“It’s fine. I’m sure no one will notice.”

“Are you sure?”

Jack bit his lip instead of responding.

Those chompers were pretty noticeable.

The tips of his fangs stuck out past his lips even with his mouth closed.

Although it was only a little bit past. So maybe people wouldn’t notice?

“Have you noticed anything else?” Maddie asked cautiously.

“No. I don’t think so.”

“Alright, well why don’t we all go back to bed and we can see how things are in the morning.”

The three agreed and filed out of the bathroom.

Danny was last and he flicked off the light switch.

Jack didn’t remember the light being on in the hall, yet somehow it wasn’t that dark.

He turned towards the source of the light and stopped dead.

“Mads.”

She looked at Jack before following his gaze.

Danny was behind them. Looking very confused as to why they were staring at him.

“What?”

“You’re eyes,” was all Jack could get himself to say.

Danny reached up on instinct to check but paused when he saw the light bouncing off his fingers.

He immediately went back into the bathroom but closed the door behind himself.

Maddie was at the door in an instant. “Sweetie, open the door.”

“But I can’t make it stop.”

“It’s okay, Honey. Just open the door.”

The was a few seconds of silence before the door opened.

“Are you mad at me?”

“Why would I be mad?”

“Cuz my eyes are glowing like a, like a, you know.”

“I just want to make sure you’re all right.”

Jack slowly leaned his way into view of the bathroom. He didn’t want to crowd the poor kid, but he did want to know what was going on.

“I’m alright.”

“Nothing hurts? Or feels weird?”

“No.”

Maddie placed her hands on Danny’s shoulders and gently pushed downwards.

That’s when Jack noticed Danny had been floating about a foot above the floor.

And that’s the same time Danny noticed too.

In shock he jerked backwards, but since he was still floating, he just glided backwards, almost as if he were on ice.

Jack saw the way his boys eyes darted back and forth from Maddie to Jack to the doorway that they were both standing in.

“Hey Mads lets give him some breathing room.”

Danny immediately looked at Jack in surprise.

Jack smiled to reassure him as he took a step back with his wife.

Danny smiled back. Just a little, but it was enough.

It took about a minute but Danny’s eyes stopped glowing and he was finally able to put both feet on the ground.

The next thing Jack new the boy was wrapping his arms around him as best he could.

Jack returned the hug and was happy when Maddie joined in too.

Then there was this odd rumbling sound.

For a second, Jack thought it was coming from a car outside or perhaps one of the many machines in the house.

But then Maddie was staring at Danny.

That’s when Jack noticed that he could feel the sound. 

The sound that was coming from Danny?

Why was his son purring?

Also how?

He looked at his wife and raised an eyebrow when she looked at him.

She simply mouthed, “side effect?”